A reporter once asked the Bolsavik about the reaction to the “flag in the foot spa” picture (see artist Chau Thuy Huynh‘s work here). “Do you think it’s cultural?” she asked. “Because nobody in the office understood why anyone would find it offensive.”
The Bolsavik had been at the reporter’s work station just a minute earlier. It was in a large undivided room with something like 20 desks. Not to mention other rooms “in the office.” Twenty journalists couldn’t figure out how the picture was offensive?
Then the Bolsavik found this on ScripturePics.org, a blog/website offering a devotional picture a week.
This picture puts the face of Jesus Christ in a foot bath, even with a bare foot next to it. And the fact is nobody finds it offensive, nobody is protesting it — because everybody apparently just knows this artist’s intention. While others would just refuse to accept artist Chau Thuy Huynh’s stated intention and would just insist on accusing her of insulting the flag.
That suggests there’s something that causes certain people (say, Christians of every ethnicity) to view art in their context. And then there’s something that causes some Vietnamese (not all, but also not just Vietnamese-Americans – the Bolsavik has received similar reactions from Vietnamese-French and Vietnamese-Australians) to automatically and irreversibly equate a foot bath with an intent to insult, regardless of context or backstory.
What’s that ”something”? Apparently it’s not genetic. So can it be cultural?
Food for thought.
Happy Passover. Hag kasher vesame`ah.
Mental reaction to something or a perception is a learned thing, thus a matter of culture. A culture encompasses the ways people think and reason which result from their education (or brainwashing). I can certainly assume that, after seeing the above picture, Professor Richard Dawkins (University of Oxford) would opine much differently from the Pope. –Tien Huynh
How would people know that is a face of Jesus? Nobody actually knows what his face looks like. Actually, if we look back to art history achirve , image of Jesus has been different from time to time and from culture to culture . So, they may NOT think that the artist PUT ” his ” or” her ” image of Jesus onto the spa. in the other hand , the image of the South VIetNamese flag is so briliant, so bright, so obvious. in the Vietnamese ‘s mindset, that thing is supposed to be up in the sky, on the pole , not in the spa. Now, the artist is changllening that permamnent mindset. She intentionally put the flag on the bansin and forced people to give the same respect. and alot of the time, people do not want to be changlenged to a new concept. it take times. how many time it will take, i do not know. never mind, just some Monday moring thought to warm up the day . cheer.
oops , yes, it can be a cultural “habit” of belief and thinking .
Come on, Bolsavik, you KNOW that MANY Christians have protested MANY instances of “art” where they feel that their religion has been defamed (e.g. The Last Temptation of Christ), so it’s NOT a Vietnamese thing. I’m also a little surprised to see you somehow suggest that we can extrapolate the thinking of 20 American journalists (who are very likely to be secular liberals) into how Vietnamese (who have been through horrible things) should feel about their flag.
Even though I myself find the foot-spa with the flag moving (especially along the article that provides the context), I can understand how many Vietnamese would find it offenseive, due to different perceptions about art (especially in older Vietnamese people). There’s NOTHING wrong with finding it offensive. That’s what art’s all about. What’s wrong is to censor it, forbid it, or to refuse to accept the artist’s intention, as in this case.
To VietPundit:
Good point. Actually I’ve always said that it’s ok to think the foot spa picture is offensive, BY ITSELF. It’s people who insist that the picture is offensive even IN CONTEXT that make no sense to me.
Anyway, as written, your comment is better than my entry. Thanks for contributing.
I don’t know about anyone else, but foot treatments are literally the utter essence of the expression “ah!” I say this because you’re literally on your feet all day (aerobic or anaerobic). When you get home from your work day, you want to relax. Some people decide to lay back on their couch. I always come home to a foot soak much like what’s being depicted here in this post. Couple that with the son of God and what this artist’s photo is saying (to me) is that no matter what, I am everywhere…even a foot tub! Now I am far from a religious zealot, but I am sure that in a sense, if a person wants to see something, eventually he/she will see that. Same goes with coincidences such as these: For most people, it could just be a crinkled piece of paper inside the foot bath. Those who believe see Jesus Christ. I see him in that bath, but not because of my faith, but because of the fact that it really does look like Christ’s face. Interesting!
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